The world was the shattered husk of once was once planet earth. The year was A.W. 227, which reads as two hundred and twenty-seven years after the official end of the War that truly did end all wars. The most reliable contemporary historians believed the date to be, according to the calendar of the 20th century, somewhere close to the year 3050. No one, however, can be sure of the exact date. The War began, according to historical records from the time, in the year 2019 when the nations of China and the United States started a dispute over an inconspicuous island called Taiwan that, after a relatively brief period of saber rattling, political posturing, and bureaucratic miscommunication escalated into full-blown nuclear war. The development of Space-based missile defense systems and a series of cease-fire treaties ended the nuclear holocaust somewhere in the 2300’s, but not before most of central China and the entire western United States had been turned into radioactive wasteland. The remaining countries of the world took sides, and a 10-year series of land-based campaigns began. The Chinese invaded the United States in an attempt to bring their superior numbers to bear, and the American army faced inevitable defeat. In the face of drooping morale and feeling the need for desperate measures, American scientists and their allies developed a new weapon of mass destruction that was not banned under the treaties. This horrific device, known as the Gravitron bomb, used a sub-nuclear explosion to rend the fabric of space-time and cause an anti-material explosion that sent destructive gravity waves rushing out with the force of a small supernova. A test bomb was carried via airplane to evade the missile shield and dropped, in a symbolic gesture, on the ruins of Beijing. The Chinese surrendered before a second bomb, deployed directly on the army itself, was necessary, and it seemed that life would soon return to a moderate state of normalcy. However, this was not to be. The hasty development of the Gravitron bomb had not allowed for much speculation into the long-term effects of its use, and these began to manifest themselves with horrifying clarity. The massive force of the explosion was sufficient to knock the earth off its axis and completely out of its orbit, sending the planet spinning off into space and beginning an age of chaos unparalleled in human history that is said to have lasted for a thousand years. In that time, massive earthquakes rent the surface and enormous tidal waves erased and created entire countries; season changed from winter to summer in a matter of days, then remained unchanged for decades. All semblances of society were quickly abandoned and humanity dissolved into a state of global anarchy. When the planet finally stabilized several miles further from the sun than its original position, it resembled nothing of its former self. The topography had been completely changed to the point where any attempt to redefine national boundaries of the Old World was impossible; regions the size of small continents had been rendered uninhabitable by nuclear fallout; the atmosphere had become highly irradiated and toxic; the oceans seethed constantly as former currents and new inertia from the planet’s haphazard rotation created perpetual turbulence; the surface temperature dropped drastically; Fortunately for civilization, the Old World satellite system still existed and functioned, and it was not difficult to establish a network of digital communication between surviving tribes of humans. They signed a treaty formally ending the War, and resolved to create a new global government that would prevent such a catastrophe from ever re-occurring. Thus the Administration was created and the New World came into being with it.
Remarkably, human understanding of technology had been preserved through the so-called Apocalypse, and it had even progressed somewhat from 20th Century knowledge. Using this preserved knowledge and the newfound art of communication, the surviving humans began constructing cities for themselves to begin their civilization anew. These sprawling metropolises spread over entire continents, and were completed in a remarkably brief period of about 100 years. Making use of newly discovered electromagnetic technology, they fashioned gigantic "force domes" which protected the cities from the inhospitable elements and also covered the remnants of Africa and South America which, although they did not contain cities, proved to still have fertile soil and were invaluable in terms of agriculture. The domes trapped greenhouse gasses and allowed people to breathe without the aid of respirators, and also maintained the temperature. There were 2 city-continents built, all simultaneously and with specific functions in the new society. The first of these was split into three major sub-cities and a seemingly endless number of autonomous urban centers, each protected by its own individual force dome. This was the seat of the Administration, and each city housed a specific government office. The first, Rome, was the meeting place of the Global Senate and covered the southern part of Europe. The second and smallest, España, was the seat of the Office of Law, which enforced the regulations of the Administration. This city was located on what remained of the Iberian Peninsula and France. The third, and largest, city was unique in that it held no specific office. Known as Babylon, it covered the entire Middle East from the African force dome to the Himalayan deadzone, and provided the industry, power, and finished goods for the rest of the Administrative complex. The other City-continent was located in former North America, and consisted of two sub-cities; Oceania and Cocytus, the former built on top of the latter. Oceania is the seat for the New World’s economy; it is the home of the Stock Market (although all trading is done online, of course) and also of the headquarters of every major corporation of the world. Cocytus serves Oceania in the same way that Babylon serves the Administrative complex. Both cities were covered by one gigantic force dome. Although the economy is capitalist in nature, there is no currency to speak of; rather employees are paid solely with company stock. The Administration is considered to be in joint ownership with the corporations, and thus receives 50% of all stocks to be distributed among its own employees. As a result, there are no taxes. Most people work either for the Administration or for the corporations, but some work as Scavengers and traders, searching the cities and surrounding wilderness for useful materials or artifacts and trading them for useful items.
The second function of the Administration was to ensure that no disaster like the War ever happened again. It passed a series of laws, collectively known as the Pax Doctrine, which outlawed the use of violence, training in martial arts, and manufacture or possession of weapons. It set up the Office of Law to act as an autonomous justice system, which was allowed to enforce the laws and punish offenders according to its own discretion. The foot soldiers of the Office of Law were cyborgs known as Enforcers, who alone in the entire society were allowed to commit violence and carry weapons. Once human, they had been surgically equipped with a metal exoskeleton and a digital uplink in the brain that allowed them to communicate with each other and the central office using a sort of technological telepathy. It was their duty to hunt down and eliminate any violators of the laws, which in addition to the original ban of violence also prohibited so-called "white-collar" crime such as larceny and embezzlement, which were cited as instigators of conflict. They did their job very well, and were universally feared. The one place where the shadow of the Office of Law could not totally permeate was the terrestrial hell of Cocytus. The city was a gigantic industrial maze, a dangerously unpredictable place where all-too-common accidents gifted the inhabitants with all manner of metal prosthetics that effectively doubled as weapons. The Enforcers could rarely distinguish an accidental injury from an intentional one, and even if intent was proven they could not typically apprehend the perpetrator amidst the mechanical jungle. The citizens of Cocytus were well aware of this, and exploited it to the highest degree, and citizens of Oceania kept well away from what they rightly considered to be a dangerous neighbor to their fine city.
With the exception of a few half-hearted rebellions at the introduction of the Pax Doctrine and the under regulated war zone of Cocytus, virtually all violence had been eradicated within a few years. However, the natural human desire to injure one another was quickly satisfied in a far subtler manner. People replaced the sense of power they gained from crushing another person’s physical body with that gained from crushing their spirit. Instead of striking another person in anger, a person will carefully cultivate a friendship, completely gaining the trust of the other, and then turn on them quickly and ruthlessly. The trauma from such an attack is so severe that it often holds physical repercussions; typically the victim, completely broken in spirit, simply loses the will to live, slips into a coma, and dies. Because of this, people live in constant fear of each other; afraid to trust anyone they do not know completely. As a result, society has fragmented into small social groups known as circles, the members of which trust each other somewhat and avoid outsiders at all costs. Circles typically form due to a common bond between the individual members, whether it is a religious belief, common interest or job, political philosophy, to name a few examples. Becoming too strongly dependent on the circle is referred to, rather ironically, as "playing games," an expression which belies the potentially deadly consequences of such an action. Some people inevitably have no circle. These are called "Pariahs," and tend to be very weak in spirit and easily discouraged and broken, thus they do not typically live very long. Certain individuals are more resilient and adventurous in nature and ‘drift’ from circle to circle, appropriately called "drifters." Most circles are wary of them, lest they turn out to be what is known as a "Catalyst." These individuals are so obsessed with the power they can wield over others that they actively seek out ‘friends’ simply so they can kill them. The Enforcers cannot regulate this activity as it cannot be proven and does not technically constitute violence.